Birds of Prey #112 [Spoilers]

This is easily my favorite issue of BoP in recent months, primarily because it features Zinda, who is one of my favorite Birds but who almost never gets much story. In this issue, Zinda skips the official Barda memorial service to remember Barda in her own way--involving a bar fight, a cross-country trip by taxi, and a Hal Jordan cameo appearance.

Zinda's woman-out-of-time characterization means that stories can be told about her that really can't about other heroes. (Speaking of that characterization, it's nice to see someone out of time who spends more time living in her new time than moping about the old one. I'm talking to you, Silver Age Captain America!) While Zinda has adapted well to the new life (and I don't know if that was always the case, or even how she managed to find her way into her future, but whenever I've seen her she's been right at home), she still has that 1940s thing going (by virtue of having been a Blackhawk) where she can get into a bar brawl as a stress-reliever, or become a little recreationally tipsy without someone wanting to stage an intervention. If Bogart could have done it, Zinda can do it. A character rooted in the modern era probably couldn't.

Fond as I am of the character, I wasn't sure that Zinda could carry an entire issue by herself, and was pleased to see that that was not a problem. We don't see a lot of her ordinarily--she spends most of her time dropping off and picking up--waiting in the car, basically--or swooping in to save the day with a neat rescue. Taking her out of that role here, we get to see a lot more of what she can do, and while she likely couldn't hold her own against most of the villains the Birds come up against (she's not that sort of superhero), she's more than a match for just about anyone else. The best thing about Zinda, though, is that she is generally such a light-hearted character, taking as much joy from her new life as she did from her old one, but she isn't stupid and she isn't superficial. Sometimes it seems like some comic writers equate "interesting" with "angst-ridden," and Zinda is proof that that doesn't have to be so.

A fun book. And IMO more genuinely touching than a lot of the other mentions I've seen of Barda's death.